


All Alone

by Tiffsyyy



Series: Writevember 2018 → SVT [3]
Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: <3, Body Switch AU, M/M, Soulmate AU, band au, rj this is for you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-08-23 02:41:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16610342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tiffsyyy/pseuds/Tiffsyyy
Summary: AU where you switch bodies with your soulmates when you turn 20





	All Alone

⋘ ──── ∗ ⋅◈⋅ ∗ ──── ⋙

 

_all alone, only the cold air is with me_

 

⋘ ──── ∗ ⋅◈⋅ ∗ ──── ⋙

 

 

_A long time ago, God forsaken men and so when you turned twenty, you'll switch bodies with your soulmates. You'll switch twice in that lifetime, once on each soulmate's birthday. Most likely, you'll be same ages with your soulmates. However, there has been rare cases where the are years apart. It is during that two switches that you must determine where and how you can find your soulmate. Each switch lasts a week_

_Since technology advanced, finding them is much easier by using social media to find each other._

 

* * *

 

 

Seungcheol slowly drifted back to conciousness, reluctant to open his eyes. It was his 20th birthday and he prayed hard that he hasn't switched yet. He'd give everything to just want to spend two seconds with his family first.

 

Opening his eyes proved him wrong greatly. The room was of a completely different atmosphere. The bright morning sunlight came in through the undrawn white curtains. Whoever this was certainly was a neat person. He hasn't really gotten up yet but the atmosphere of the bedroom already screamed neat. Asides the fact that the curtains were white, he could see that the walls were a calm blue and the room smelled like sea salt– must be air fresheners– and the owner of the room. It just smells human. He slowly got up, letting himself adjust to his new body for the next week. Does this person work? He looked at the hands– you can tell a lot of someone by looking at their hands– and it was definitely male hands, which didn't really surprise him– seungcheol was bisexual after all. They were delicate and soft, slightly crooked at the pinky. The nails were short and round.

 

Neat, seungcheol thought.

 

Seungcheol was surprised that this was the first switch; it meant he was older. As he thought that, he got up from bed, gingerly putting away the blanket. He looks around and discovers, yet again, that whoever's body he was currently inhibiting is a neat person. The bedroom was minimalistic, with barely anything at all. In front of the bed was a fairly huge drawer cabinet and atop it was bulletin boards. Yes, boards. There was more then one of them, varying from cork boards to steel boards.

 

To the left there was a closet and a door that he guessed was a connected toilet. His side table had a vase of flowers and, as he had expected, sea salt scented beads. His phone was charging there too. He picked up the phone and switched it on. To his luck, it didn't have a passcode like his did (he hoped he'd remember to remove it last night). Tapping on the Instagram icon, he went straight to the profile

 

It seems that whoever this guy was, he had quite a following. 300k wasn't a small number if you were any average person– he'd know since he himself only had about 200 followers, a quarter of which were most likely fake accounts. He stared at the name, made sure he remembered it.

 

 _Joshua Hong_.

 

He went over to the search page and looked up his username. There he was, a humble account of, well would you look at that, 160 followers. His finger hovered over the direct message button, contemplating whether to send himself a message. Has Joshua even woken up in his body?

 

His took away his finger and put the phone to rest.

 

He looked at the reflection of Joshua's face on he phone screen. He was quite obviously korean and seemed to be a soft looking guy. Joshua had soft brown hair too and his face seemed a bit red due to the recent waking up. This was how he was going to look like for the next week. Will he be famous for a week? He didn't know

 

Furtherly inspecting the room, he discovers a mirror adjacent to the toilet door, perpendicular to the bedroom door. He went over to the mirror and finally really saw how Joshua looked like. For a split second, he wonders how to act as this Joshua person and if he is a famous person. He also wondered how Joshua would react in his body

 

Joshua didn't look like he did real sports– he was lean but not ripped–and quite tall, estimatedly as tall as himself. The shirt Joshua had picked to sleep the night before was a thin,loose black shirt that revealed too much flesh in this type of season and a pair of basketball shorts. Suddenly, seungcheol was cold. Curious, he lifted the shirt a bit. Underneath was tight abdominal muscles that doesn't look like it'd be forming abs anytime soon. Unfortunately,nature calls an he realizes he need to got to the toilet. Silently apologizing to the body, he went and did his business

 

When he came out, the phone alarm rings and the footnote said "shower and vocal practice, be at studio by 10". Seungcheol looked over to the clock hanging above the bed– strange, why would one have a clock above their bed and not across it?– and saw that it's still 8. However early he was, he didn't want to risk it so he rummaged around the closet for underwear and headed to the bathroom.

 

While showering, he realized that 1) he didn't know how to do vocal practice and 2) this would be the first time he'd be listening to the voice of his soulmate. He cleared his throat at said,

 

"My name–" he couldn't finish the sentence– he was too shocked by the voice. It was light and airy, soft like how Joshua looked. A large contrast to his own deeper voice "My name is Choi seungcheol"

 

His name rolled off weird, like it was his first time saying it. He smacked his head. Of course it was. At least for Joshua's mouth, it is. He continued doing some melody stuff and got off the shower. After drying off and wearing the underwear, he went over to the closet to find clothes to wear for the day. At the end, he settled with a black ripped jeans (he couldn't find one WITHOUT a rip) and a black hoodie with a big peace sign on the back. Then, after making sure that his hair wasn't a bird's nest (it wasn't but making sure is still a habit), he stepped out of the bedroom.

 

The outside was quiet– it was obviously an apartment from he layout. Part of him was glad that he didn't need to deal with "the family recognising" but part of him wished he could have a mother figure to lean on for the next couple of days.

 

The apartment, like the bedroom he was in moments ago, was also very simplistic with minimal furnitures. The floors were wood and it was very clean. The first place he went to was the kitchen.

 

The cabinets were filled with instant food and junk food. Seungcheol was overjoyed when he saw that Joshua ate the same brand of cereals as him (well at least they now had a common factor to go by and to talk about when they met. Imagine that. Talking to your soulmate who you met for the first time in your own body about cereals) but couldn't feel the same when he went to look for the milk. Along the milk in the fridge was a few bottles of protein shakes, each labelled with the days of the week. He took out the one labelled Wednesday. He decided that no matter what happens int he next week, he should properly take care of this body as it'll become the body he'd one day cherish.

 

He sat down and silently ate his breakfast. As he did so, he scrolled around the phone to look for more information on Joshua. He found out that Joshua was a guitarist for a (quite) famous band called 'VT' that stood for 'Vocalising Technicians'. He watched a few of the videos Joshua had on his phone of his teammates. They were good, like professional standard good. He hoped that he could do justice of it in this week. He's only learnt how to play guitar when he was younger and recently did dabble in the music world but he was never apart of it.

 

He looked up the names of the team members to remember and there was five of them:

 

The drummer, main Acapella vocalist and leader, stage name, woozi, real name, Lee jihoon,

 

Main vocalist and keyboardist, boo seungkwan,

 

Main vocalist and hyper, stage name,Dokyeom, real name Lee Seokmin,

 

Lead vocalist and basist, Yoon Jeonghan, and finally him,

 

Lead vocalist and electic guitarist, Joshua Hong, also known as Hong jisoo

 

He took note of the names and faces. Hopefully he'd remember them. After further digging of the phone, he found his daily schedule which to be fair, isn't too complicated except for a few parts where he saw "vocal recording" and "guitar recording" that made him nervous.

 

Oh boy.

 

He checked the time and saw that it was 9 now. He had an hour to compose himself. He washed up the dishes and went to explore the rest of the apartment. There was a kitchen, of course, and his own bedroom and bathroom. There was also a guests bedroom and a guest bathroom.

 

He stood in the room he hasn't opened yet. Something felt ominous about this room but he entered anyway.

 

The room was painted in a very dark blue. It's the same color Branch as the master bedroom but ten times darker. There was a few guitars seated on their own stands. An acoustic without wire connection, an acoustic without wire connection and an electronic one. He picked up one of the acoustics and an instant wave of nolstagia hit him. He remembered when he was eight, when he was sent to music classes and was offered the guitar. He strummed the strings. Without thinking, his fingers strummed a tune he's never heard before. It sounded very acoustic but it also sounded like it would belong to a rock band.

 

Was this muscle memory?

 

Checking the time again, he decides he shouldn't wait any longer as he wanted to find the studio. He put back the acoustic and packed the electronic one in the guitar case on the table. Next to it was a backpack, in which when he checked it's contents, it was full of music sheets which he assumed were what he was supposed to play later. He took the backpack and guitar case, took the phone on the table in the living room and was ready to leave but he took some time to find the house keys which were hanging by the front door in plain view.

 

When he left the apartment, he took some time to navigate around the building, not knowing where is the exit. Finally, he was out and he hooked up a cab

 

"Bumzu studios and production, sir?" The driver asked. Seungcheol just assumed he was right as he had briefly saw that VT was under Bumzu S&P. He nodded and they were on their way.

 

It didn't take long to arrive, perhaps about 20 minutes but regardless, he was five minutes late now and he didn't know if he'd be scolded but he rushed up anyway. Once inside the building, he didn't know where to go. Lucky for him, there was a band member in the lobby.

 

Woozi, he thought. The male in front of him looked at him and amongst the smug emotions, he saw surprise.

 

"You're early today" woozi commented. "I thought we wouldn't see you until noon"

 

"Um... Early start today, woozi" he replied. Woozi eyed him suspiciously. Seungcheol panicked. Did he say something wrong?

 

"Were you having a one night stand last night? I told you shouldn't. We have voice recording today. Those blowjobs are gonna fuck up your throat"

 

"No.. why?"

 

"Are you sure you didn't, shua? Then why are you guilty? You never call me woozi unless you're guilty"

 

"Oh um, well. Yeah I suppose I feel guilty for coming in late yesterday" seungcheol replied. It wasn't a good answer but woozi seemed satisfied "sorry, uh, ji"

 

"Ok then" and he walked off. Seungcheol followed suit, trying to remember the building layout. They entered the lift

 

"Not getting your coffee?"

 

"Not in the mood"

 

"Wow who are you and what have you done to Joshua" woozi sarcastically said. Seungcheol knew it was a rhetorical question but he couldn't help but feel attack.

 

They arrived on the fifth floor– practice room. The rest of the group was already there.

 

"Alright. Vocal warm up and straight to song practice. The we record. I wanna finish whatever we didn't yesterday today"

 

For the next few minutes, they did vocal warm ups. He wasn't familiar with these thing but this body is so he let it do it's thing. Joshua had a nice voice. Definitely had been trained before already.

 

When they got to the practice part was when he panicked a little too much. He kept making mistakes. Obviously this made the other members angry at him. He really didn't mean it but he didn't know how to play, after all.

 

"WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU TODAY, JOSHUA" Woozi yelled. It was a breaking point. "HOW ARE WE SUPPOSED TO RECORD TODAY IF YOU PLAY THIS BAD"

 

Seungcheol apologized profusely. "Actually.. I have something to tell y'all. Can– can we have a meeting?"

 

They all sat in a circle, attention all diverted to him.

 

"I uh.. I'm not your Joshua" he started "I'm Choi seungcheol, his soulmate and my birthday is today"

 

"Oh" Jeonghan said "so.. you switched bodies huh?"

 

"I guess?"

 

"Happy birthday" seungkwan whispered

 

Woozi sighed. "This is gonna be a long week"

 

* * *

 

 

Joshua opened his eyes and the first thought he had was that he had a jam packed day ahead and that he can't bear for Hoonie to nag him again. As fast as he got up from the bed, he was quick to be stopped in his tracks.

 

This room wasn't his.

 

As far as he knew, he didn't have a one night stand last night as they had recording today. So what exactly was he doing here? He looked down at his hands. They were slightly bigger, manlier and rougher. They were not his. A thought flickered in his mind.

 

No, no, NO THIS CAN'T–

 

He ran over to the mirror that's hung on the wall and he nearly screamed. Nearly. His mouth, or rather the man in the mirror's mouth gaoed open on shocked. He took a step back, trying to process everything. This was the first switch, meaning this is either a really bad dream or this was his soulmate. He pinched himself hard

 

Nope, definitely not dreaming.

 

All this while, he hoped he was older than his soulmate. Male or female, he never really minded but so suddenly? This guy just had to have his birthday a week before the band's next release.

 

Daring to look into he mirror again, he observed the man closer. He had round eyes, thick lips, strong jaw and arms which were very packed with muscles. He must be a personal trainer or something.

 

Shit! The instrument recording was also gonna be today! Did this guy even know how to play guitar? Joshua worried about his guitar.

 

Deciding that he wouldn't be able to do anything, he looked around the room. The walls were dark brown in color and the floors were tiled– a complete opposite if his own room. There was the mirror (not full bodied) hung on the wall next to the wardrobe (which is quite smart) and both of these are to the left of the bed. The side table had a set of keys (house keys?) and a phone sat, charging. He randomly opened the drawers but there were only a few things inside (a motivational book of sorts and a first aid book?). There was also a coats' stand next to the door which had coats, caps and random t-shirts hung on in. Everything in this room was either black or brown. The room was also small and packed unlike his spacious and simplistic one at home. He wondered if his soulmate lived with anyone.

 

The first thing he decided he needed was a shower to recompose himself. Yes, he was freaked out about showering in a foreign person's body but he's got to. He opened the wardrobe and took some clothes and towel with him. Now to figure out where the shower was.

 

He creeped out of the room with his necessities and spotted an empty bathroom opposite his bedroom. He contemplated for a moment before entering the bathroom. He gently closed the door just in case he did have house mates.

 

While showering, he thought of what he should do, now that he's in his soulmate's body. Of course, he had to find him so social media first thing. Then, what? He had a week and he wasn't sure what this man worked as. Joshua could only hope it wasn't a personal trainer or something. He started doing vocal warm ups despite that he didn't need it right now.

 

His current voice was slightly deeper than his own but it was smooth as he hummed. He started singing a little melody of the new song VT was supposed to release next week. He hoped that if this guy can't sing, at least he'd tell jihoon about the situation. Of course, the comeback would be delayed by this. Hopefully their Tecchies were forgiving crowds.

 

Once he was done showering and properly dressed in a t-shirt (not from the coats'stand) and jeans, he returned to the phone that was still on the nightstand. He wanted to see what he was up against

 

There was no lock, thank goodness. He had quite a few apps and games but he quickly selected Instagram as it was the easiest platform to work out who he was courted to by fate. He went over to the profile and, while he ignored the username, Joshua's eyes were fixated on the name.

 

_Choi Seungcheol_

 

What a beautiful name.

 

He searched up his name, still salty that Instagram hadn't given him the blue tick when the rest of his teammates has. He ignored it and clicked on the search result. His profile opened up and... Since when was he on private? No wonder his followers count had frozen for a while. He sighed and tapped on the follow button, resolved to waiting until seungcheol notices that notification.

 

Just then, he heard his stomach grumble and he didn't notice his hunger until now. He got up and got out of the room for the second time that morning. The living room was spacious and the kitchen connecting to it was empty. He opened some cabinets and the fridge, on a quest for food. Finally, he found a box of cereal similar to the one he always ate and milk from the fridge. He settled on the dining table. Seungcheol must have teammates if he had a dining table.

 

"Good morning, hyung" a voice behind him said. It made him jump but he calmed down and turned around to see a younger American looking boy stretching his muscles and yawning. He nodded and continued eating his cereals.

 

"is today your off day, hyung?" The boy asked.

 

"I- yeah" Joshua replied. The boy took out a packet of bread and butter front he fridge and started buttering a slice

 

"strange, you don't usually get off days on Wednesdays. You said hospitals are packed on Wednesdays"

 

"I asked for it because–" he needed to make a reason quick " because it's my birthday and I wanna spend it with my favorite house mate"

 

"aw hyung I'm your only house mate"

 

"you get what I mean"

 

Joshua felt his heart (is it acceptable to say that this heart is his yet? Seungcheol hasn't fallen in love with him yet) beat fast in his chest. He didn't even know the boy's name. He can't just go on not knowing his name! He has to find a way to ask–

 

"wait hyung isn't today your 20th birthday"

 

He gulped, almost choking on the milk. Should he? He should.

 

"can-can I trust you?" Joshua asked.

 

"Of course, we're best buddies!" The boy said with gusto. He puffed up his chest with pride "If I had to give a penny for every secret of mine I've told you, I'd probably won't be able to pay next month's rent. It's my turn next month, right?"

 

"Then I'm not your hyung"

 

"what– oh!"

 

There was a steeping silence that followed. Joshua had never felt to awkward and he was almost sure the other male felt the same as he silently buttered another slice of bread. Silence can be deadly. This silence hurt him in many different ways.

 

"what's your name? I, um, didn't catch it" Joshua said after a whole eon of silence

 

"Hansol Vernon chwe, yours?"

 

"Joshua Hong" he said. "I assume you know English?"

 

"Yes" Hansol replied

 

"Then..."h–hansol-ah.. can you speak English? I'm more comfortable in that"

 

"okay"

 

Although awkward at first, they ended up sitting through breakfast talking about seungcheol and what he does, familiarizing himself with the man he was gonna live in the body of for the next week. He learnt that seungcheol was a paramedic with no fixed time of work and that seungcheol had been on a 48-hour shift two days before and he usually got a one day break for every two days so he assumed he was supposed to be back to work today. On this topic, Hansol lit up.

 

"hyung, you should call in sick" Hansol suggested

 

"will they be okay with it?"

 

"Just say it's your 20th birthday, they'd understand. Remember when– I mean, there was once when your shift partner did that and cheol-hyung had to cover four days of work. He was gone in a light when he came home"

 

"well if you say so"

 

After much consideration, he dialed, who according to Hansol, was seungcheol's shift partner for this month.

 

"Hello?" He said. He was already nervous "um yeah, I'm afraid I won't be able to come in today– what? Yeah it's 8th of August– oh really, you're willing? But for the next week– you got it covered? Alright um– thank you, uh– wonwoo"

 

That went smoother than expected.

 

"Hansol-ah, do you know if seungcheol pre-planned his work schedule if he switched?"

 

"Not that I know of"

 

"Ah– ok. Then may I ask if that was that the shift partner seungcheol had to cover?"

 

"No, that was another person"

 

"okay"

 

With everything out of the way, it meant he had the next week free. He should use the time to find seungcheol and since right now, he's in daegu it would be roughly be 2 hours away from Seoul. He looked at the phone again. No Instagram notification. He wondered how seungcheol was doing in his own body for the nth time that morning

 

Maybe he misses his old life more than he thought.

 

* * *

 

 

_You have received a follow request from @joshuahong951230!_

 

_Accept request?_

[ _Yes]_

_[No]_

_@joshuahong951230 started following you._

_@joshuahong951230 has requested to chat_

_[Accept]                      [deny]_

_ <Hello, is this Choi Seungcheol?_

_Yes, it is. I assume you're the owner of this body and my soulmate? > _

_ <I hope I am. Otherwise we'd switch bodies for nothing._

_By the way, woozi asked me to inform you that your guitar has been confiscated by him until we switch back >_

_ < [>o<]_

_ < Can I go to Seoul to visit you while we're switched?_

_I think we should do that at the second switch. When's your birthday? > _

_ <December 30th_

_read 10:00pm✓_

 

* * *

 

_However, humans took this opportunity for granted so God interfered one last time by making it that if you do not find and hold your soulmate's hands within a month from the second switch, your connection will be broken and you will never find him or her again. When it's broken, you can't fall in love again and you are condemned to be lonely forevermore. When it's broken, you will forgot about the existence of your soulmate._

_Some soulmates who lived very far away from each other and didn't have the means to see each other unfortunately lived this fate. Some, who still took this arrangement for granted, accepted this fate wholeheartedly. It is a cruel fate to some but a blessing to those who has fallen in love with someone else._

 

* * *

 

The rest of the week went by quite fast. Both men got cose with each other's friends. Seungcheol learned how to play the electric guitar good enough for the recording, in which a few parts was played by woozi. The mv was to be released a day after they switched back and their promotions would last one and a half months, just in time for the second switch.

 

When they switched back, everyone was relieved. That week was torturing, in a way but both seungcheol and Joshua seemed to have gotten used to each other that when they switched back, they were quite upset for a while. But they were reunited with their lives so they put the thoughts of the next switch behind.

 

December came with a roll and VT ended promotions with four wins. The two soulmates were giddy for the next switch and they had chatted on Instagram almost everyday. Time seemed to slow but they had each other.

 

A week before Joshua's birthday, he bought a train ticket to go to daegu. The date he was going was two weeks after He needed to tell jihoon though. When he did, he was met with harsh reality

 

"Are you crazy? The concert is on the seventh of January! You know how hard it was to rearrange dates? and we have to leave for Japan on the 31st! You can't go now!" Jihoon exclaimed

 

That brought his spirits down hard. He had forgotten about the concert tour. And he had also forgotten about the fact that the tour would last two months. By the time they finished, Joshua would already forget seungcheol. And seungcheol would already forget him. He didn't want this to happen. But it would and fate was laughing at them.

 

He couldn't tell seungcheol this. Both of them were clearly in love with each other already, despite only knowing each other for less than two months. Fate was ripping them apart and he was helpless.

 

* * *

 

Joshua's birthday came around and they both woke up in each other's body that morning. However excited seungcheol was, when he woke up and saw the luggage neatly packed by the closet, he was met with a feeling that something is wrong. He called up Jeonghan, whom he had gotten close with during the time he was in Joshua's body during the previous switch.

 

"Good morning– wait, is this Shua or cheol speaking now?"

 

"... Cheol"

 

"Oh, good morning, seungcheol"

 

"I have a question. Is Joshua going traveling or something?"

 

"He didn't tell you? VT is going on a tour for two months. We had to arrange the first concert to be later so we can have Joshua back by that time but you'll be coming with us to fly to Japan!"

 

Suddenly, everything crashed around seungcheol. This means he would not be able to meet Joshua if they were having a tour. This means, despite finding his soulmate, he won't be able to love him.

 

Oh

 

_Why?_

 

The tears streamed down his cheek

 

* * *

 

 

_February 5th_

_One laid under the stars_

_One laid in bed_

_Both convinced that they were looking at the same moon_

_—_

_"I'm not lonely" I said to the stars in the night sky. They twinkled back innocently_

_"I'm really not lonely" I insisted when they didn't respond_

_"I'm absolutely not alone"_

_—_

_I just wish for someone to tell me I did a good job when I return from work._

_Someone to encourage me when I go to work_

_Someone like you_

_—_

_We're looking at the same stars tonight but why are we so far?_

_—_

_I'm all alone_

_—_

_Alone in the midnight sky_

_—_

_Alone in the cold bed, wishing you could be here_

_—_

_The stars and angels watched pitifully as another pair of soulmates were ripped off each other. A beam of light lowered to both of them, reaching into their minds and pulling out a string. This time, it was bronze in colour and a garland of moonflowers and white lilacs vined itself around the string. Inch by inch, both of their strings were pulled until none was left. No memories of each other was left, only fuzzy recognitions of one other. They were both asleep_

_All along, they were not meant to be_

**Author's Note:**

> i reached a new milestone :D


End file.
